Guatemala News

HIS scene is good  chuck-it-all fantasies: Riding a handsome mahogany mare, I'm following my machete-packing guide, Jason Smith, through a rain forest in Belize. Absurdly oversized ferns gently swipe my sandy boots as we negotiate the green-canopied trail; to our right is an anthill the size of a child's igloo, rising from our left are trumpet trees, great oaks and vertical palms splayed out like a giantess's fan.

Here are puckery crimson blossoms called hot lips; here, too, black orchids, clay-colored robins and madre de cacao flowers that cure pink eye. Mr. Smith, who works for Francis Ford Coppola at Blancaneaux Lodge, the most spectacular of Mr. Coppola's Central American properties, crushes a small green leaf and reaches back over his horse's rump to hand it to me. It's rich and complex: allspice.

As my horse picks her way down a stream bank and scrabbles back up again, her hooves making scraping sounds on the stones, I'm doing a little dance inside: Tomorrow, I can hop a hand-cranked ferry across the Mopán River to Xunantunich, a Mayan site known for its commanding view of the jungle. Or I can take a private canoe trip into a remote cave where the Maya buried their dead. All this, and I can still have room service. And a massage from a Thai genius named Prasert. And a loll in the hot pool near the Privassion River, at the foot of the hill upon which my personal cabana is perched.

Because this moment was created by Mr. Coppola - director, producer, writer, winemaker and hotelier - it feels slightly unreal, but in the nicest possible way. In my experience, this sort of outing has been synonymous with slogging, sleeping on the ground and feeling like a contestant in a reality show. In order to see the Himalayas, for example, I once trekked for eight days in August with two guides and four ponies - chugging water that reeked of iodine and breakfasting on raw apples. And when I went to Camiguin, a volcanic island in the Philippines, the only time I wasn't slicked in grease and sweat was when I was paddling in a reef with sea snakes.

But here at Blancaneaux and at Mr. Coppola's other Central American properties - Turtle Inn, in the village of Placencia on the coast of Belize, and La Lancha, on Lake Petén Itzá in Guatemala - travelers who might have been backpackers in another era can enter an authentic but sensually gratifying version of the third world stage-managed by a master. The feeling at Blancaneaux Lodge and at La Lancha, which I also visited, is that of being at a private club for experienced travelers hip to the notion of exploring, preserving and celebrating the indigenous culture without sacrificing laundry service and a wine list.